Is human ‘messiness’ better than a synthetic performance?

Exploring the topic of synthetic sounds further we will come across the way the absence of messiness affects our perception of sound. Vibrato has already been mentioned along with similarity of attack (and indeed all aspects of the sound envelope). The human performer alters each note according to his / her taste and experience, where computer controlled sounds repeat a regular formation. This is particularly the case with keyboards, and while controllers for pitch and dynamics have their part to play in manipulating sounds they are generally clumsy and in exact in live performance.  Recently the keyboard player of Dream Theater, Jordan Rudess, brought out an iPad app which permits glides and vibrato, this offers room for greater interaction with synthetic sounds.

Another area of messiness in real life or organic instruments is the percussive sounds made as the player interacts with his / her instrument. In a performance of synthetic instruments the listener is often only aware of the sound produced. I noticed this when recording a Bach partita on a simulated pipe organ, one recording I made live, and the other had the signal fed directly into the amplifier. The degree of percussive noises on the keys was far too strong on one recording and wholly absent in the other, neither were particularly satisfactory. Percussive sounds can contribute to the overall package that makes a performance though these are not normally indicated in the score. There are works in which percussive or scraped sounds are a feature of the writing as in Jonathan Harvey's fourth string quartet. Percussive sounds of instruments used as a rhythmic feature do occur in more traditional formats such as the accordion accompaniment to tango. It may be a matter of taste as to how much the percussive action of dancers on a stage add or subtract to the performance and how much our brains filters or focuses on one sound or action over another.

In an organic performance there is further messiness in the actions of the performer, the movement's made indicate to the eye much of the drama of the music, the closing moments of Paul Tortelier’s TV recording of “Don Quixote” with tears running down his face made an enormous impact on his audience even as a reproduction on a (then) tiny screen and poor sound. Is this relationship and interaction not possible with synthetic instruments? What is essential to recognise is that the voice of a well-built instrument has a quality all of its own.

The primary sense of the brain is vision, blindfold a person as they eat and much of the experience is diminished, in fact the process of taste can be deceived; (there is a good account of this in “The Idiot Brain” by Dean Burnett). When we attend concerts we might not consider the importance of vision but we are reacting to cues all the time and it informs our understanding and enjoyment of the performance. Naturally opera draws on all the cues available which is why this irrational art form is so powerful.

On the chart reference was made to Stockhausen's "Hymnen" in the version accompanied by instruments, the integration of human and synthetic sounds in performance creates a very different ambience. There is more to the addition than just doubling the music to a national anthem. One might ask why it was not taken further with brass bands performing on stage. Naturally there is a limit to theatrical music in terms of cost and staging difficulties. In popular music the marriage of synthetic and organic instruments (and hybrids) is far more common, and where money is less of a problem elaborate staging and video presentations are ever more regular.

Midi offers considerable control over matters of timing and here again messiness is an issue. Any performer who uses midi recording as a learning tool will know that their most precise performances are full of alterations to the score, but the tension created through messiness is the heart and soul of performance. Where does this put music specifically designed to be wholly accurate? Is Milton Babbitt's “Ensembles for Synthesizer” a museum piece or stimulating to the senses? I find that there is more than a period charm to the music, am I responding to the design and form of the structure and accepting the precision as a necessary component?

The question of rhythmic precision becoming robotic is fundamental to drum machines, there are many jokes about these,

Why is a drum machine superior to a drummer?

You only have to beat the rhythm into a drum machine once.

What was truly surprising was the way in which the popular music world developed the drum machine's regularity into a feature of dance based music so giving a new life to old technology.

However, the drum machine, which offered a wider variety of drums than the synthesizer, is not used exclusively in its intended manner. Instead, its preferred use by rap musicians is for producing the low concentrated booming, bass sound characteristic of rap music. Increasing the bass is not simply making the music louder, but rather deals with the issue of the quality of lower-frequency sounds at high volumes, and this was achieved by manipulating the equipment. Kurtis Blow explains that the Roland TR-808 is the ideal drum machine for rap because of the way it processes bass frequencies: 

The 808 is great because you can detune it and get this low-frequency hum. It’s a car speaker destroyer. That’s what we try to do as rap producers—break car speakers and house speakers and boom boxes. And the 808 does it. It’s African music!

Adjoa Poku http://web.mit.edu/21m.775/www/Papers/pokuFinal2004.pdf

 

For a large number of listeners the robotic is more than acceptable as a companion to messy human performance. This argument becomes more interesting when one considers the use of the turntable as a means of sound production, this style / development is not restricted to popular music, contemporary musicians increasingly turn to the possibilities in its use.

In Dean Burnett's “The Idiot Brain” much is made of fight or flight responses and how they shape our character. This works in the theatre and concert hall even though a stage is out between us and the action. There are numerous examples of ppp giving way to a loud fff chord, Tchaikovsky and Stravinsky both make good use of the effect, and this works equally well with synthetic sounds, after all there is no indication at all from a loudspeaker of a change to come.

Can we respond to a cabinet containing a loudspeaker? In one way we do, their presence on stage indicate power, just as the formal dress of an orchestra does. These days the multiple cabinet displays are unnecessary and musicians may put empty boxes on view to stimulate our responses.

So the question of synthetic use is bound up with a number of characteristics that we may at first discount. Within the limitations of the thousand word blog it comes down to this, it is possible to create a powerful presentation using synthetic sounds and instruments, indeed they may help produce a superior result. What goes with that statement is not the need for ever more sophisticated technology (developments will come) but a careful use of what we have available to us, and as so often that means taking the time to shape the music with audience response in mind.